


No Soldier Can Be Left Behind

by letitrainathousandflames



Series: Clone Trooper Files [4]
Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Dogma is locked up after that mess in umbara, Foreshadowing, Hurt/Comfort, Other, Rex comes to talk to him, This is a prequel to a finished work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-23
Updated: 2018-01-23
Packaged: 2019-03-08 11:02:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13456860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letitrainathousandflames/pseuds/letitrainathousandflames
Summary: Prequel to The Time Passed In ExileDogma is locked up after killing Pong Krell in Umbara, and feels less and less connected to his life, turning to self-harm. Rex pays him a visit and makes him a promise.





	No Soldier Can Be Left Behind

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Time Passed In Exile](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12932013) by [letitrainathousandflames](https://archiveofourown.org/users/letitrainathousandflames/pseuds/letitrainathousandflames). 



> Self-harm/cutting and blood at the beginning. Angst all over it.

Every day begins the same way. The sun rises, yet he can’t see it. Instead, all there is is a white light that shines on the ceiling of his cell, telling him there’s another day ahead of him.

 _Stars_ , he doesn’t want another day. He just want this nightmare to be over. He just wishes he could not have to wake up ever again.

Dogma sits up, running a hand over his hair, and he can feel it growing thicker out of the military crew cut. They wouldn’t let him tend to his looks, so he didn’t have a razor or a pair of scissors to trim his hair, or his nails for that matter.

_He used to be such a proud soldier, always proper, always clean, and then Umbara happened and all that mess happened, and he shot the men of the 212th, his own brothers, and he ordered Fives and Jesse executed, and Tup, his own batch brother, had never seemed so disgusted at him before..._

Krell’s laughter rings in Dogma’s ears, and he shakes his head at it.

He rubs his thumb on his nail, which is almost passing over his finger at that point, and he looks around to make sure he’s alone. _No one around. Well, then..._

Dogma pushes the sleeve of his left arm and rakes his nail, hard, against the inside of his forearm. The burning feeling spreads over his skin, and he clenches his jaw, swallowing hard. It grounds him. He presses his nail harder on the soft skin. He’s not in Umbara. He’s in Coruscant, in jail, and even if he can’t tell if one is really worse than the other, he needs to snap out of it or he’ll go insane.

His nail digs into his skin, and he hisses as blood oozes out of the small wound. He looks at it with a morbid fascination. This is his blood, the same blood of his brothers, the same blood of the blueprint from which they were built, Jango Fett. He’s still one of them, even disgruntled and tossed in this hole, he’s still a trooper.

 _Stars_ , he misses his armor so much. He’d been taught to think of his _soul and heart_ to be shared with the white plastoid plates. Of his _honor_ to be drawn on the blue lines. Now all he has is his red blood, and it’s not even close to enough. Hardcase had been granted the honor of dying with his armor, and Dogma doesn’t know if he should feel bad about wishing he could’ve shared his fate, because the thought of withering away in this cell until the guards find his lifeless body scares him more than any explosion he’d seen back in Umbara.

His cell doors slide open, and a voice comes through the speakers as a small droid floats in carrying food on a plastic platter.

“Your breakfast, CT-5345.″ says the droid in a monotone

Dogma quickly lowers his sleeve, cleaning the blood off his fingernails.

“My name is Dogma.” he says; he repeats this everyday, more to himself than the droid. The truth is that he fears he’ll forget it at some point.

“Your cell will remain open for your exercising period." the droid says, ignoring him "You are free to stretch your legs for a little while, if so you wish, CT-5345.”

He hates that the droid calls him that. It reminds him of Krell calling Rex and Fives by their numbers. He had raised a lightsaber to ARC Fives’ face. _How could I not have the judgement in me to see how kriffing messed up that was?_

“No. I don’t want to.” Dogma mutters to the droid “Just leave me alone.”

And so it does. Dogma eats, although he doesn’t quite see the point in it. He wishes he could starve himself to death, but he doesn’t have the willpower to do it. So he eats, then he rereads the only thing they let him keep, the reg manual he had carefully transcribed by hand to a notebook - electronics werent allowed in the facility, but since Dogma knew each line from heart, he’d taken up the distraction of writing it all down, and now he rereads it, every day, every single line of what makes the clone troopers and their Jedi generals the most powerful weapons of the Republic. He likes to read the lines out loud, he always have, and he remembers ARC Fives shaking his head at him in the barracs with a small smile saying, _you know, kid, you remind me of someone I knew._

Dogma never knew if that was supposed to be a compliment or an insult. Being constantly picked on by the others, he was leaning towards the latter.

“A trooper’s strenght is in his squadmates.” he reads “If there is no unity among the soldiers, then the battle is already lost.”

_Will the prisoners request to be blindfolded?_

“A clone trooper’s trust in his fellow soldiers...” he reads louder now, trying not to think of his own words and the spite in Fives’ stoic features

_I hope you can live with yourself, Dogma._

“...is your most powerful asset...” Dogma booms, swallowing hard

_You had my trust. My loyalty. I followed all of your orders... and you made me kill my brothers!_

“...and the only thing...” Dogma screams out, his mouth quivering at the corners

_That’s because you’re the biggest fool of them all, Dogma._

“That will lead you...”

_He betrayed us._

“...TO VICTORY!” Dogma screams, snapping his book shut

He screw his eyes shut exhales, breathing hard, so hard he almost doesn’t hear the door slide open and the droid speaking.

“You have a visitor, CT-5345.”

“His name” says a voice identical to his own “is Dogma.”

Dogma opens his eyes and sees no other than captain Rex standing at the door and walking in. For a solid moment Dogma thinks he’s seeing things. Rex is a Captain. He doesn’t have time to go to Coruscant’s jail to talk to a malfunctioned clone who brought nothing but shame to the 501st battalion. But as Rex steps forward, standing in front of Dogma and gesturing to the small bed by the wall where he’s sitting, asking if he can sit too, Dogma frowns tugging at his sleeves to hide away his small cuts and scabs. _He’s here. Captain Rex is here to see me._

Dogma nods hesitantly, and Rex sits by his side. He stays in silence for a long time as the droid leaves them alone and the door slides closed. Dogma can feel the warmth of Rex’s body irradiating from him as he sits a few inches away from Dogma, and he clenches his teeth, shoving his hands between his thighs and closing his legs on them in order to restrain himself from hugging his Captain. He misses physical contact so much. Not that he would be the main target of hugs and hands rubbing on his back, not him, the stuck-up, rule-loving trooper that everyone made fun of. But Tup, his batch brother, would nudge him kindly on occasion.

Back then, Dogma would sleep on a bunkbed close to all his brothers - he never thought he’d miss Hardcase’s snoring throughout the night, or the daily ritual of putting on his armor, which he did see with a lot of meaning, but had taken for granted (and now he’d do anything to be able to at least put his gauntlets on). He missed the coded blue stripes that he had earned, he earned his place on the 501st with his effort and it was taken from him so suddenly, his pride and his armor ripped off like his own flesh over his bones and--

“I did all I could, Dogma.” Rex interrupts his train of thought with a low voice that sounds almost like praying in a temple “Spoke to the generals, General Skywalker had contacts in the Senate, and Senator Amidala from Naboo did her best on our behalf but the public is really concerned about...”

He trails off, hesitating and running a hand over his mouth and chin, sighing.

“About... A clone capable of killing a Jedi, specially after...” he hesitates again, and Dogma turns to look at Rex, seeing his brown eyes flickering with anger and helplessness “After Tup shot a Jedi general too.”

Dogma’s book drops from his fingers, falling on the floor. He must be really going insane. He can’t have heard it right.

“Tup...” he echoes, and his voice is raspy, his throat straining at the attempt to talk because he haven’t spoke to anyone besides the droid for two months now “Tup did what?...” Rex merely nods “How? He wouldn’t, not Tup... Was... Was that another traitor? Like K... Like him?”

Dogma cannot bring himself to say Krell’s name. He can’t. Rex shakes his head.

“No. She was a good general. A good jedi. And Tup just...” Rex presses two fingers to his skull imitating the gesture of pulling a trigger “There was no saving her. Fives tried to stop him, but it was too late.”

Dogma’s eyes go wide, and he frowns. Tup was a good soldier, one of the most serious men of the 501st, the only one to stand Dogma and his obsession with rules and regulations, he wouldn’t do such a thing...

“Well, and where is he? Will he be shipped to Coruscant too, to... to here?”

Dogma looks around his cell, and he wants to punch himself for almost wishing that Tup really got arrested and could keep him company, because he feels like the loneliness will make him lose his mind anytime soon. Rex swallows dryly.

“No, Dogma, uh... He’s... He’s dead.”

It hits Dogma like a punch to the gut. Dead. Tup, his batch brother, his last batch brother alive, dead. For some strange reason his mind goes to ARC Trooper Fives, of whom he had heard that he was the last of his batch too. Like he can read his mind, Rex talks of Fives too:

“Fives found out something... Something that could mean our doom, all of our brothers’. I’m gonna investigate it, Dogma, and I won’t stop until I get to the bottom of this.“ Dogma sees the fire in Rex’s eyes, and it reminds him of when the Captain walked down to the containment cells in Umbara to confront K... _That man_ “And I have decided that until I see this through, I’ll never let another brother die under my command.”

Dogma looks away from Rex like he’s a beacon of light to bright to behold, and he nods.

“Why... Why did you come here, sir?” he hesitates “I-I mean, you’re a busy man, a Captain, I don’t get why would you come here just to talk to the malfunctioned clone.” Rex turns to look at Dogma, and his expression is telling of how angry he is with his former trooper, and Dogma bows his head so low his chin almost touches his chest “You don’t have to pretend, sir.” he says as he stares down to the identification bracelet they’d sealed on his wrist to identify him by his birth number “I know I brought shame to the 501st. I know I did wrong to Fives and Jesse. I know I... shot that... that man and...”

“Dogma...”

“All I wanted was to make you proud, sir.” Dogma blurts out, not knowing why he’s letting these words spill out of his lips and not doing anything to stop it either “Just wanted to do my duty, to be a good soldier, and I failed my very first assignment under your charge and I’m so sorry...!”

“Dogma.” Rex places his hand on Dogma’s shoulder and it’s warm and heavy and his thumb brushes over the edge of his bone and the tensed up muscle “You didn’t fail. You didn’t.”

“...shot so many of the 212th,” Dogma wants to shut up, but he can’t, _he karking can’t_ so he just keeps talking “so many of my brothers, the shot that got sergeant Waxer was mine, and he died, and so many of them died, and I didn’t even question our orders, and I almost had Tup shot Fives and Jesse, and he’d hate me forever and now he’s dead...!”

“Dogma!” Rex reached for Dogma’s other shoulder, forcing him to turn and face him “listen to me! You shouldn’t have even _been_ there! You were below the minimum age for enlisting, your were eight! Eight! I took my first assignment when I was nine and I was _kriffing terrified!_ What they asked of you was absurd, you hear me?! Unhuman!”

Dogma’s sight grows blurry and he feels the hot tears spilling over his face.

“I still should’ve been better, I should’ve...” he sniffles “Should’ve... And I failed...”

Rex wraps his hand over the back of Dogma’s head and carefully pulls him towards himself, pressing his head to his armored chest.

“Breathe, kid.” he whispers to then place his chin over Dogma’s head “Breathe. You’re trying so hard, aren’t you? You always have. You need to stop it, or it’s gonna end up killing you. Breathe.” Dogma hesitates, sniffling, to then raise his arms and slowly reach over Rex’s waist, hugging him. Rex hums. “You’re kriffing _shaking_. Kark, what have they done to you...”

Dogma wants to stop crying, to stop embarrassing himself like this in front of his Captain but he can’t and his shoulders are shaking at his sobs, and he just can’t understand why Rex is doing this but he doesn’t care, he misses his brothers _so much_ , and the news of Tup had left him devastated and he needs this, needs to allow this pain to leave him - from any way other than his cuts and scabs, so he cries until his voice is hoarse and his throat feels narrow.

When he finally does mean to collect himself more or less and tries to pull away, however, Rex still holds him close and his voice drops to a whisper so low even being that close to him Dogma can barely hear Rex.

“I will be back in two days. Kix got it all set, and Wolffe will get the security holovids out of order for a few minutes. I can’t explain all of it, but we’ll get you out of here. Don’t worry, I’ll be back for you.”

Dogma doesn’t pull away, but his eyes go wide as he shakes his head.

“No, sir. Don’t. Don’t get in trouble for me, don’t--”

Rex presses his head so hard against his plastoid armor it almost hurts.

“I swear for my life, Dogma, I meant it, every word. I won’t let any other men die under my command. Wait for me.”

Without another word, Rex lets go of him and gets to his feet, leaning down to pick up his handwritten reg manual. He folds an ear on one of the pages and hands it back to Dogma, saluting him. Dogma wouldn’t be able to stop himself from returning the gesture even if he wanted to. And he doesn’t. Rex nods at him and, as the droid returns just in time to slide the door open to him, he leaves, his steps dying away in the distance as the door closes once again.

Dogma just sits there, eyes on the door for what seems to be a long time, contemplating everything that small conversation meant. Only then he lowers his eyes to his book, opening it on the page marked by Rex and reading it.

_It is a clone trooper’s duty - from the highest commander to the lowest cadet - to look over his brothers in arms. The troopers must resist all adversities together, and no soldier can be left behind._


End file.
